


Rivelon (Title In Progress) - Preview

by GaySuperman



Category: Original Work
Genre: Fantasy, Gen, LGBTQ Character, LGBTQ Character of Color, LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Magic, Multi, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:08:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28245210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GaySuperman/pseuds/GaySuperman
Summary: You may be used to these stories of magical worlds where the "Chosen One" receives a letter and goes to school to learn how to use the power and do amazing things. Real magic, is often a bit of a letdown. Sure, magic is great but most magicians can only do one thing. Each magician has a gift and they can learn to use it but can never truly harness the other magics. Once in a blue moon, a magician is born who can do two but they are incredibly rare. That being said, magicians are incredibly blessed but they are not all-powerful by any means. That being said, you can go to school to hone your gift and that's exactly what I am doing at Rivelon. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's get to the real characters.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 1





	1. A Potential Beginning - Declan "Dex" Miller

**Author's Note:**

> This is the original work that I began for NaNoWriMo in 2020. It is still a work in progress so things are going to change but I'd love to get feedback and start sharing what I have so I'm going to post some stuff on here. Updates will occur but may be slow. I do hope to publish this at some point :) so the plan is to only show a TEASER here. THE FULL STORY WILL NOT BE SHOWN. I hope you enjoy.

Declan Miller has never been all that good. That isn’t meant to be a statement of morality, sure he isn’t good but he also isn’t evil by any means, rather it was a statement of general quality level. He’s never been very good at anything he’s tried. Don’t get me wrong he’s not too bad a footballer, he can hold a tune decently well, even dance a bit, and he’s been known to turn a few heads amongst his peers but in general, he’s pretty average in almost every sense. He’s never been considered as anything to write home about. On the flip side, he’s never been truly awful at anything either. That was the case at least until something magical happened.  
One day Dex, as he prefers to be called, was walking home from school. It was his senior year and he was excited to get back to the little flat in London he called home. His mother had promised a special dinner as it was his birthday and things were shaping up to be a pretty great one at that. Sarah had led his friends in singing happy birthday to him at lunch. David even brought in a cake that said “Happy Birthday, You Dex Machine”, a pun that had occupied an inordinate amount of Declan’s brain over the last 5 hours. Yes, the day was surely going to be the best day of Declan’s short life. Or at least that’s what he’d thought.  
The sun had almost fully set on the pristine little street where he was walking. The light had become diffuse softening the edges of the buildings while the streetlights cast bold shadows on the walls. Declan walked slowly, enjoying the cool breeze and the soft beats playing in his headphones, savoring the day and hoping for it to never end. The song in his ears made him think a lot. It was a smooth love song and Declan always had difficulty relating to those kinds of songs. He would normally roll his eyes to the sappy bullshit about a man seeing a woman and wanting to make her his. Gross. Possessive. Total patriarchal bullshit. But this time was different. The music swelled over him as he walked inciting a feeling of longing in him and he kept thinking about the grin on David’s face when he presented the cake to Dex, how smug and proud of himself he looked. That memory made him feel oddly warm and he found himself smiling too. How peculiar.  
As Declan rounded the corner, entering the street where he lived, he noticed that something wasn’t quite right. For one, he had the sudden and unnatural feeling that he wasn’t supposed to be there. This was clearly absurd on the face of it since he was almost literally born on this street, according to his mother, since his father had tried to call a cab to take them to the hospital but no one would take them. He also noticed that the entire street was empty, an unusual circumstance given tonight was proving to be one of the nicest nights of the spring. He would normally expect the street to be filled with kids of all ages playing pick up football matches or hopscotch. As he scanned the street he saw that he wasn’t completely alone. There was another man around his age on the other side of the road who seemed to be calling out to Declan. When Declan blinked, however, the mystery man was gone. As he strolled further down the street Declan noticed another two people, both were very short and stood hunched over, wearing trench coats and hats on his front porch, one wore a flat cap like a newsie, the other a fedora like a detective. Declan wouldn’t have found this suspicious had the rest of the street not been so vacant of all life and sound, being as it was, Declan felt it best not to be seen so he ducked into a side street.   
Having grown up on this street Dex was very familiar with all the nooks and crannies. Having snuck out with David and Sarah on more than one occasion, he had a whole system put in place for getting in and out of his apartment unseen. His neighbor, Mrs. Enderson took pleasure in telling his mother every time she caught him outside the house at night, so he had developed a sneaky out of the way system to avoid detection. Once in the alley he quickly located the umbrella he kept stashed beneath the dumpster and used it to pull down the fire escape of the neighboring building which hung just within reach unlike that of his own. From there he could climb two floors up where he had placed a bit of plywood. He quickly stretched this plank across the alleyway forming a makeshift bridge between the buildings and crawled across.  
Normally Declan, having completed this feat of acrobatics would have continued up three floors to reach his apartment but once he’d drawn in the plank he found himself moving in the opposite direction back down, toward the trenchcoated hat wearers being drawn by a strong sense of curiosity. As soon as he started to hear voices he stopped, stooping low, and he listened closely.  
“What’s taking the boss so long?”, a nasal voice, unlike anyone Declan, had ever heard stated.  
“What makes you think I would know?”, replied a deeper and scratchier voice. The voice had the same strange quality to it as if being produced by vocal cords of sandpaper.  
“I saw you two the other night making eyes at each other over dinner. Something’s going on between you two. I’m not judging, I just assume you’d know more than me, you love bird.”  
“I don’t know what you are talking about, but as for knowing more about what’s going on, I can assure you I was told the exact same amount as you did. The only difference is that I have two whole brain cells to rub together. The boss is meeting with a potential client, some bigshot with cash to burn. This meeting is important and not to be disturbed under any circumstances, so he’s having us wait here to keep people from coming in.”  
“Shouldn’t the hex be enough to keep the Magischlos away”? Declan was sure he hadn’t heard that correctly. The hex? What’s that supposed to mean?  
“You know the boss. Plan B needs a plan B and all that, always have a backup. Besides, the hex will only keep Magischlos away by manipulating their emotions, the last thing we need is a stray magician.”  
“Don’t think I didn’t notice you dodging the ‘love bird’ comment. You gotta give me something. I heard he has..”  
“Quiet! I think I heard something.” The low voice interrupted. Declan held his breath. From the mouth of the alley, he saw a shadow getting bigger and so he hid behind Mrs. Enderson’s flower box. The shadow kept getting bigger until Declan could discern the fedora on the shadow's head.  
“Bah! There’s nothing here. Either way, I’m gonna do a sweep of the block I’ll be back.” Declan heard some footsteps quietly fade and decided to cut and run. He wasn’t sure who these people were but something inside him told him he didn’t want to get caught spying on them.  
Declan quickly walked up the fire escape and climbed through the window pushing in through his blackout curtains into a very dark room. Declan gave a small sigh welcoming the familiar scent of his mother’s cooking and the calming blue barely discernible in the dark room. He liked to keep his room dark because the street lights made it difficult to fall asleep. That being said, it made sneaking in difficult as they left the room pitch black when his light wasn’t on. He slowly started walking toward the light switch. His reprieve, however, was interrupted as he was once again greeted by an unknown voice, this time through his door to the living room.  
“I assure you, we have methods you would find quite extraordinary.” The voice said in a very heavy accent. German perhaps? Declan shifted closer to hear better. “This task you need done, it may seem challenging but I assure you it’s a simple matter for us, you’d be in very capable hands. For our services in this, we’d only ask a taste of your gifts Seer, nothing monetary. I believe this could easily be the start of a great and mutually beneficial...” Declan’s weight shifted as he lost his balance for a moment causing the floorboard beneath him to creak.  
“What was that?” the heavily accented man asked. Declan then heard a set of footsteps approaching and once again began to hold his breath. Declan didn’t know what was going on. Why was this man in his house? Where was his mother? What was this task? And where could he hide? The answer to the latter question he found first, crawling under his bed just in time to hear his door creak open.  
From under the bed, all Declan could see was a pair of very nice shoes and a nice tailored suit walking toward him very slowly, stopping right next to the bed. The figure paused for a moment and then squatted down as if to look under the bed. Declan saw a hand grab his comforter and as if in slow motion, pull it up. Declan was filled with a sense of dread and tried to manifest the stranger into stopping by chanting “stop, stop stop” in his mind. As the comforter was being pulled up, Declan heard a sound like a gas burner starting, and then “WOOSH” a giant fireball exploded pushing against him, flinging him in the other direction. Sensation went away until all Dex could feel was a soft feeling of falling, until the breath was knocked out of him and he was swept away by unconsciousness.


	2. Another Beginning and An End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A new character is introduced on their way to Rivelon. I hope you all love Leo because I am obsessed with him personally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: Mention of Nazis and Terrorism (obviously negatively)

That same day started very differently for Leopold Schneider, a youth from the upper echelons of the German elite. Leo has been dreading this day for a long while. Today is the day in which he will be forced to abandon his home for the cold halls of Rivelon University. Leo looked out from the safety of a treehouse he had built with his father when he was eight, viewing the lush green landscape of his family’s estate through the creeping ivy that had taken over half of the window sill. As he sat there with the sun emerging slowly from the horizon over a small pond, he contemplated how such a terrible day could be so beautiful and calm.  
It wasn’t fair. The semester hadn’t even started yet and he was being sent early to participate in yet another military boot camp at his uncle’s insistence. He had of course been attending Rivelon Gymnasium for the past four years and couldn’t find it in himself to hate it the way he’d hoped. He liked learning about the magical world as well as about the things Magishlos care about; science, math, literature. All of the things any budding magician might need to know. Rivelon Gymnasium wasn’t too different than his primary school had been. The only difference is while primary school focused on controlling his power, Rivelon Gymnasium focused on preparing him for the world. Leo had always been a bit special since his family was so ingrained in the magical world, everyone just assumed he would be magical. Of course, the Department of Secrecy had required him to complete a Discerning before he could be enrolled but he had never attended a nonmagical school. The magical world is what he knew and it was part of him. No, he wouldn’t mind going to Rivelon at all if it weren’t for his uncle and his terrible plan.  
There are very few things that have been denied Leo in his life, not that he would ask for much anyway, as he’d usually be content sitting next to a warm fire watching the stars. One of the biggest things that Leo couldn’t have though, was a future of his own creation. Tracing back 12 generations, Schneider men have served in Germany’s military which means a lot to many people but not terribly much to many others. Leo had pointed out that there are a few generations during those twelve generations that we should definitely not take pride in. That’s when he learned about his great grandfather, his namesake, and a founding member of the Nazi Punchers. Evidently, his family’s service wasn’t only contained to the military but various areas of public service including the original Leo’s involvement in an underground resistance during World War 2 called the Nazi Punchers. This started Leo’s love of comic books and family history. His namesake’s history was fascinating and his involvement in World War 2 had been chronicled in a popular magical comic book series called “The Adventures of the Nazi Punchers”. Leo loved these stories of his great grandfather’s exploits but he had no interest in going to war himself.  
Unfortunately for Leo, his uncle took the tradition very seriously. Since Leo was old enough to play, he’s been set to playing war games. His uncle gave him toy soldiers at 3, a toy pistol at 4, and an army uniform costume at 5. To make the matter even more plane, Leo had 3 older brothers, who have all taken to military service in stride and with pride.   
Yes, poor Leo’s path had been set a long time ago and I must say it was not to his liking at all. At every turn, Leo attempted to get himself out of his fate. When his uncle signed him up for a marksman class he “accidentally” missed the target so much he broke the window of the instructor's truck. When his uncle signed him up for a Junior military boot camp, Leo pretended to have an asthma attack. One of his favorite attempts was faking a fainting spell when he had to dissect a frog for science saying the sight of blood made him feel sick. Surely his uncle could see that Leo was not meant to be a soldier right?  
The only thing that Leo and his uncle agreed on, in fact, was scouting. His uncle believed it wise that Leo should learn how to take care of himself in the wild so he’d be prepared for any combat scenario and terrain and Leo was quite content to spend time in the outdoors for that was the place where Leo felt truly at home.  
When Leo was just a boy, his father, when he wasn’t at work in the Bundestag, would take Leo out into the woods of their estate and go hiking. He would point out which plants were poisonous, teach Leo how to lash a shelter out of a few meters of rope and dead foliage, and how to read maps. Those were some of the best days that Leo could remember but this was before the bombing.  
Leo’s father, Archibald, had always been very carefree and easy. He took his job seriously and always fought for the little guy, taking a special interest in immigration reform and racial equality. Then a bomb went off in the Reichstag. Luckily very few people were hurt but it was enough to change everything. Overnight there was a push from the right to crack down on foreigners and the country took a major turn toward both nationalism and isolationism. No more did Germany want to be in the global community, it wanted to be left alone. This pushed Archibald Scheider and he became the face of the movement countering that ideology. Instead of closing the border, Archibald fought to increase aid to refugees. Instead of deporting undocumented immigrants, Archibald created programs to help them attain citizenship. Archibald became consumed by his work and his day hikes with his son became a thing of luxury and were few and far between. In place of Archibald, Leo’s uncle took the lead in Leo’s life pushing him further and further away from his dreams towards the perfect little soldier boy of tradition.  
This was the state of Leo’s world as he went to Rivelon, a place his uncle had insisted upon so that he could harness his magical ability for combat use.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed my first ever novel (well the preview anyway). I'm hoping to publish this eventually as a full book. If you are interested in receiving updates feel free to subscribe to the mailing list [here](http://eepurl.com/hmOVFr). NOTE: I will not spam you or sell your email, I will only send you updates when I add content here and if I have any publishing updates.
> 
> Best,  
> Gay Superman


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